


Perfect Imperfection

by wordsliketeeth



Category: Mystic Messenger (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, But Nothing Too In Depth, Canon Compliant, Denial of Feelings, Developing Relationship, F/M, Finger Sucking, Frottage, Grinding, Healing, Light Sadism, Love Confessions, MC Has Minor Non-Canon Details, Protectiveness, Rough Kissing, Trust Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-27
Updated: 2020-03-27
Packaged: 2021-03-01 08:08:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,169
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23348197
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wordsliketeeth/pseuds/wordsliketeeth
Summary: "'If something happened to you I would never be able to live with myself,” Saeyoung admits. The confession doesn't imbue you with happiness, however; instead, it sounds like the shattering of glass and cuts deeper than the sharp edge of potentiality. “Don't you get that? Do you know what you're doing to me by loving me?'" Saeyoung tries to fight his feelings for you but he makes the mistake of meeting with you one last time.
Relationships: 707 | Choi Luciel/Main Character, Saeyoung Choi/Reader
Comments: 8
Kudos: 226





	Perfect Imperfection

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Rensui](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rensui/gifts).



Saeyoung can't remember the last time he spent this much time on the road. He's been driving around aimlessly all morning, and more recklessly than one should. He knows that speeding won't outrun his thoughts, that he can't chase away the feelings winding tight in his chest but it's all he can do to escape the reality he's created.

He wants to close his eyes, if only for a moment, but he won't throw away all the years of pain he endured so easily. He spent seven years mourning a life that was lost to him and three more trying to change with the times—all while feeling that he didn't have a heart and hope was a thing of the past.

The thoughts in his mind are as distant as the sea is to his back, but he's been thinking about what his life could be if he started from scratch. He exhales a ponderous sigh and wonders if he's turning his back on a good thing. He catches his eyes in the rearview mirror and his reflection is enough to make him turn the car around. He knows that he shouldn't and he feels guilty for it. He has no right to be so caught up in looking for love when he knows his love runs cold.

Saeyoung feels the tension in his foot when he applies more force to the pedal and begins speeding down an old dirt road. “ _What am I doing?_ ” he asks himself aloud, his voice foreign to his ears and as cold as the wind that cuts through the trees.

He still doesn't have an answer to that question when he pulls up outside your apartment.

He shifts his car into park and presses his forehead against the steering wheel, his fingers curling tightly around the warm leather until his knuckles turn white from the strain of his grip. He catches his bottom lip between the edges of his teeth and bites down until the pain lends him a grain of motivation.

He thrusts himself back against the car's patent leather seat and curses. His left hand is on the door handle when the modified voice of his cell phone resonates through the car. He picks it up and glances at its face before tossing it aside, flinging the car door open with more force than strictly necessary.

He can still see the electronic imprint of his phone's screen like a tattoo across his vision when he slams the door shut with undue force, the words of your daily affections burning like the sun behind his eyes.

Saeyoung strides up the concrete walkway leading to the apartment's entrance with haste, his hands deep in his pockets and the impetus of his visit playing like a mantra in the back of his mind. _This is it,_ he thinks, smearing moisture into the dry cracks lining his lips as he punches in the apartment's entry code with mindless ease.

His knuckles feel raw when he raps on your door. His focus has turned shadowed like a dark and distant storm—which is what it feels like when you open the door and he pushes his way past you with the violence of lightning capable of splitting the night in two. Your happiness sinks to the low of your belly like a stone and you have to focus your attention on swallowing your next breath so you don't choke on the emotions cloying to the back of your throat.

“Why are you so determined to save me when you have so many problems of your own?” His tone is grating, harsh against the obscurity of his throat. He doesn't face you but you can see from the tension that's tugging at his spine that he's agitated. His emotions are stringing him taut, pulling him so thin that he's bound to snap.

“I don't think you need to be saved, Saeyoung. I just want you to understand that you deserve much more than you allow yourself. You deserve to be loved.” You lower your gaze to the floor because you're starting to feel like you're diving headfirst into shallow waters and his blatant disregard is anything but reassuring.

Silence spreads through the room like a plague, hot like the sun on a sky-blue day. You feel heat sticking to your skin and the dying spark in your chest somehow fans into a steady blaze. It turns your heart to ash and you think you're going to choke on the emblematic smoke filling your lungs.

You don't know how much time has passed but it feels like an eternity before Saeyoung's voice finally quashes the silence. “Why do you have to care so much about me?”

You can't parse the confusion in his tone from the hurt and the anger but you know that there's something dangerous beneath his words. Even still, despite the underlying threat, there's something almost definitive in his question, something demarcated and terminable, like a train coming to rest at the end of the line.

“I don't _have_ to,” you answer slowly, each word rounding itself into caution-born clarity. “But I do and I can't help that. I love you, Saeyoung. It's only natural that I would–”

“Stop!” Saeyoung turns around to face you for the first time since he entered your apartment. “It's simple, ____. Find someone else. You're young and stupid and too stubborn for your own good. I'm not interested in your love. If you really care about me and want to help, then let me go. Move past this childish crush and stay far away from me.”

“How can you be so cold?” You hate the way your voice shakes but you lift your head and meet his veiled gaze with what you hope to be confidence. “I know what you're trying to do and it's not going to work. Do you really think that you're the only one who's suffered? Are you that self-important? I am not a child and I am fully capable of loving someone who walks a perilous path.”

“Why didn't you tell me?” His tone changes and you feel like he's pulling himself in several different directions at once. He shifts as if he wants to approach you but he quickly decides against it and curls his hands into fists instead. “Jumin told me that you're being bullied by your competitors for refusing to use your connections to the RFA, and I heard from Zen that you're working yourself to the bone during practice. Jaehee's worried about how much time you're trying to set aside for me between your hellish schedule and school. See, every time you text me another pointless proclamation, I'm learning something else about you from my _friends_. I don't even _know_ you, ____.”

“That's not fair, Saeyoung. You can't expect me to tell you everything when _you_ tell me nothing. And I didn't tell you any of that because I didn't think it was important.” You pause and slant your gaze to the side, unable to breathe beneath the weight of his stare. “I didn't want you to think I was being weak. I wanted you to see my strengths, just like anyone would, but I'm still human and I can't be strong all the time.”

“I never expected you to be strong for me. I didn't want you to be _anything_ for me.” Saeyoung exhales a rush of breath and runs a firm hand through his hair. “I don't want you, ____.” He lets his arm fall back down to his side and tramps forward, seemingly unable to meet your wounded expression. “Leave me alone from now on.”

You don't know if it's the wavering notes of his cool tone or the panic that lances through your heart, but you reach out to clutch at his arm as he walks past you, your fingers biting into the soft weave of his favorite hoodie. “Don't! Don't say that, Saeyoung.”

Saeyoung rips his sleeve out of your grip and steps back as if he's been burned by your touch. It hurts, almost as much as the possible truth behind his words. “Stop trying to make this happen,” he snaps, his eyes smoldering with animus. “You can't save me. You can't _be_ a part of my life.”

“Why? Just tell me _why_?” you shout, struggling to keep the pain out of your voice and your disappointment locked deep in your chest. You can feel the heavy threat of moisture collecting along the lines of your lashes but you refuse to cry.

“Because if something happened to you I would never be able to live with myself,” Saeyoung admits. The confession doesn't imbue you with happiness, however; instead, it sounds like the shattering of glass and cuts deeper than the sharp edge of potentiality. “Don't you get that? Do you know what you're doing to me by loving me?” He moves forward with alarming speed and braces his hands on the delicate curves of your shoulders. “I don't want to hurt you. Please don't make me leave here knowing that I've–”

“Then don't leave,” you interject, reaching up to gently grip his wrists in your hands. “I need you, Saeyoung. I love you with all of my heart, and you leaving here isn't going to change that. I can't help that I fell in love with you any more than you can try to make me believe that you're telling me the truth right now.”

“This isn't a game, ____. I'm trying to protect you. How can you not see that?” Saeyoung's fingers press into your shoulders hard enough to bruise as he bodily shakes you.

“Saeyoung, stop it. This isn't you. I know that you want to protect me but you can't make these decisions for me. This is _my_ life. If I want to love you, you can't stop me.” You squeeze his wrists before tugging his hands away from your shoulders. You take a step back and inhale a deep breath. The magnitude of the distance between you is almost suffocating and you think that if you don't escape from beneath its crushing weight you might not make it out alive.

“What's it going to take?” Saeyoung asks, but it doesn't quite make it to a question because the anguish in his timbre drowns out the intonation. You open your mouth to offer up some form of a reply but he's leaning forward to crush his lips against the parted soft of your own. It's sudden and desperate and it makes you forget everything you want to remember.

Saeyoung's hands feel everywhere at once as he walks you backward until the wall behind you becomes your sole support. His fingers brush over the hem of your shirt before slipping beneath the thin fabric to track the curvature of your spine. You lose the ability to parse the situation to the heat of friction on your skin. Saeyoung's fingertips have turned to callouses from years spent at his many computers, the patterns of keys etched into his touch. You pin your focus on that point of contact but your concentration is quick to splinter off in branches—Saeyoung licks into your mouth and begins to purr incoherency against your lips. You forget where you were only minutes ago, losing time to Saeyoung's touch as he slides his hand down the low of your belly and past the waistband of your pants.

“What are we doing?” you ask, slightly breathless as your tone breaks into a higher note than what you're used to. “If you're going to change your mind then don't–”

Saeyoung reaches up and presses the flat of his palm over your mouth. “Stop talking,” he whispers, arousal dripping from his request. “Don't make me rethink what I'm doing. Please. I'm tired of giving up on what I want.” His fingers skate along the angle of your hip, his thumb following the shallow depression of flesh and bone. “I'm so tired of being scared.”

You don't try to ask him what he's afraid of—you know that he wouldn't tell you now even if you begged the words from his mouth. He wouldn't tell you the truth, wouldn't offer up any vulnerability, and his voice is dropping so low that you can't even tell if he's being sincere when he admits that he wants you. But you can't lose this opportunity, can't give up on the possibility of a wishful future because this is all you've ever wanted.

For the first time since his arrival, all you can see is the intensity of Saeyoung's gaze. The heat glossing over the dark gilt of his eyes spells something like desire, and you can almost feel the adrenaline surging through his blood in the pulse thrumming through his palm. It makes you feel intoxicated and wholly exposed even before Saeyoung slips his hand between your thighs.

His fingers are firm and seeking, and pleasure surges through your veins like a summer storm. Thunder pulses through your ears and the last bones of your apprehension get washed away by the torrential rains of thirst. You feel overwhelmed, lost under the pressure of Saeyoung's presence and swallowed by the breath ghosting the glow warming your cheeks. You shudder when his hand shifts, fingers glancing the pulsing thrum of desire that flares hot under his touch. You tip your head back against the wall for support, and when Saeyoung slides his palm across your lips you mindlessly take his fingers into your mouth.

Saeyoung moans and the sound of it melts like honey in the back of your throat. It plays in your head like a litany and burns like the salt-sweet of his skin against your tongue. You undulate your hips and grind against his touch with inherent absentmindedness, imparting a sense of urgency that renders you defenseless.

You don't realize that you're vision has gone black until you're blinking Saeyoung back into focus, eyes coming open on a kaleidoscope of color and waves of heat. You barely notice, however, because the bright slant of Saeyoung's smile promptly overtakes your sight. It makes your heart hammer in your chest and the blood in your veins rush to sound that hums in your ears.

You part your lips as if to speak but Saeyoung presses his fingers firmly against your tongue and shakes his head in an unspoken request that demands silence. You blink caution and curl your tongue around his warm digits complacently, nodding as slow as the thick of pleasure creeps into your bones.

You half-expect Saeyoung to take things farther, to slip his fingers under the elastic of your panties or to pull aside the fabric to tease his digits into the wet heat of your sex, but he does neither. Instead, he removes his touch from the apex of your thighs to fit his hands against your hips, his thumbs alone enough to brace you in place.

“Show me how much you want this,” Saeyoung says, and he might as well have spit into your mouth for the way the request is sticking in your throat.

His eyes are bright and searching but they're losing their spark to the shadow of his hair. Yet, the obscurity isn't enough to conceal the suggestion that plays over his gaze or the damp of his swollen lips. You swallow thickly but your propensity for his touch makes it difficult and something clicks in your throat before it stills itself to silence. Then Saeyoung smiles, and the simple gesture has heat pooling in the low of your belly—another spark ignites and you chase the flash until it fizzles out somewhere between your knees.

You don't know what he wants, not initially, but clarity comes as clear as the crystal waters of certitude when he fits a leg between your thighs and turns your stability into something salacious. You fumble for purchase and let the wall take your weight so you can give yourself over to the resistance pressing against your clothed heat.

Your mouth comes open on a formless expletive and Saeyoung traces the shape of your lips as he begins to move his leg slowly, grinding his thigh against your sex. The motion begs for patience that you're not fully capable of, and you have to hold your breath to keep yourself grounded against the electricity that's striking hot against every nerve-ending in your body. Each shift and every calculated movement begs for completion and at this moment, it feels like you're going to lose your mind.

Humiliation comes on like an incipient cold because Saeyoung is executing an act that spells degradation. You grind down against his thigh in a pursuit you wouldn't be able to bear if not for the sensation trickling through your veins like the finest of wines.

Saeyoung leans forward to fit his lips against your own in a hungry kiss that underscores dominance. The slide of his tongue, the gentle scrape of his teeth that lingers just long enough to suggest that he's savoring the way you taste, it's controlled rebellion at its finest.

You lend more of your weight to the wall and hasten your motion, working over Saeyoung's thigh like a shameless animal in heat. The corner of his mouth lifts, returning to the shape of the smirk that cut into the dig of his mouth previously, and suddenly he's kissing you in truth, his mouth moving in time with the friction massaging his thigh.

He moves with the intuitiveness of a rare great mind, moves like he knows _exactly_ what he's doing—and in truth, he does. It's almost as if he previously charted every inch of your body in preparation for this moment. The thought catches in your throat and stills your breathing, and no sooner than the ability returns to you, you're inhaling tiny gasps that denote desperation.

You reach one hand out to the firm resistance of Saeyoung's shoulder and slide the other through the soft fall of his hair. You whimper when he lifts his leg higher, his thigh quickly becoming the main support of your weight as the slip of friction turns harder. He laughs quietly, more breath than volume, but it's plain to see that he's getting off on your discomfort.

You drag your nails along the line of his scalp, his soft strands catching between your fingers. The gesture is meant to take the shape of unstated warning but Saeyoung shows no signs of displeasure. You furrow your brow and a whine of frustration breaks in your throat before you can call it back.

“I always knew you were a” –you gasp and bite down on the inside of your cheek as Saeyoung applies more pressure– “sadist.”

“I never denied that,” he tells you, his fingers dragging hard against your hips to ensure the promise of future contusions.

“What if I'm not a masochist?” you ask, panting. You tighten your fingers in his hair, his unkempt vermilion waves twisting into a knot before falling through the gaps between your loose digits.

Saeyoung doesn't offer you a response but it doesn't matter, not when the fire lighting up his gaze is matched with the radiance of his smile. It captures your breath and capitalizes your appreciation into an outpouring of inevitability. It's too much and not enough and everything that _should be_ feels like a flight of imagination.

You undulate your hips and grind against the rough friction of Saeyoung's jeans, pulling at his hair as you begin to choke on stale oxygen. You know that you're standing at the edge of a precipice but you can't prepare for the fall before it happens. You cry out and the sound strings itself into high-pitched resonance as you shudder against his thigh, fingers tensing and legs trembling.

Saeyoung chuckles as he lowers his leg and places his foot firmly on the floor, his eyes alight with amusement. However, the luminosity burns out against his wolfish grin, an indication of his hard-won arrogance. His eyes are glossy like dark pools bristling beneath moonshine, his gaze the casement to his heat-soaked thoughts.

He slides one hand away from your hip and presses it against the small of your back. He tugs you forward and right into the arms of precious balance. Your legs are weak and you can't keep yourself from falling against his chest but his breath remains faultless in contrast to your own staggering inhalation.

“You're playing a dangerous game,” he says, walking his fingertips up your spine.

“Why is that?” It takes more effort than it should to ask the question, and you don't even hear it leave your thoughts over the static filling your head. Your focus is taken by the thrum of your heart and the traces of electricity still branching through you.

“Because I'm a dangerous person,” is Saeyoung's response. He offers you nothing beyond the simple statement despite knowing that it carries a thousand implications with it. Nonetheless, you don't bother reaching for elaboration because his words have always been provocative and you've learned by now that there's no point. Saeyoung only offers as much as he's willing to propose and that overture is nothing more than a formless number.

In lieu of speech, you trail your fingers over the front of his jeans and note the prominent fullness of his cock pressing against the dark stitching. Saeyoung hisses a breath between his teeth and his attention skids out of focus, his mouth falling slack and his eyes fluttering shut behind the long lines of his lashes. His shoulders tense but he fails to hide the shudder that crawls up the length of his spine.

You smile and press your mouth to the overheated rush of his breathing. You slide your tongue across his lips and feel a moan vibrate through him as he tugs you closer. His teeth catch at the bottom line of your mouth and you can't ward off the shiver that spreads to weakness in your knees. You retreat slightly but keep your hand on the tenting denim that's pressing against your palm.

The silver cross around his neck catches reflective in the light above you and you suddenly feel like you're standing at the spot where the ruins of the altar and the blunted mountains meet. You take a deep breath and hold it as though every remaining shred of your sanity depends on this moment.

“What if I don't care? What if I accept it?” You trail your hand up and over denim stitches, fingers reaching for the waistband of his jeans. Your knuckles graze the sliver of flesh between his jeans and the cotton of his shirt, the brief contact making you long to feel his body against your own. You leave the red fabric of his shirt wrinkled as it sticks to the perspiration and warmth of his skin, tacky and too hot.

You push aside what you want and focus on the imperative, though it's not easy. “Saeyoung, I don't need a reason for loving you and I don't need to hear your excuses. I'm capable of handling whatever it is you think I can't. I told you, I'm not a child. I know what I want.”

Saeyoung averts his gaze and sighs. It sounds like giving up as much as it sounds like a burden, and you can feel its weight in the dread that sinks to the bottom of your stomach like a stone.

“I don't understand you,” is all he says before he cups your face in his hands and pulls you into a kiss. You can feel his hesitation in every line drawn into his palm, in the unsteady beat of his heart, but his temptation is caving in and all that really matters is that he's not running away.

You wrap your arms around his waist and hold him close, too afraid to let him go and too invested in the satisfaction swamping your veins. It might be selfish, you think, but if loving Saeyoung too much means that you're flawed, you'll wear your blemishes with pride. There's too much anguish and hardship in being perfect anyway—even the most pious aren't free from the shades of night's decay.

You think about telling him that everything is going to be okay, that you're willing to love him even if a day comes where he can no longer accept it. You want to tell him that you'll always be there for him, no matter the cost; that if he needs the sun, you'll be his light and if he wants it darker, you'll kill the flame. You want to tell him that you'll give him everything.

It all sounds good strung through the gossamer webs of your mind, but you don't dare interrupt the slow friction of his mouth moving against your lips because right now, for the first time since your starting confession, everything feels effortless and sound and near-perfect.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!


End file.
